To link to the entire object, paste this link in email, IM or documentTo embed the entire object, paste this HTML in websiteTo link to this page, paste this link in email, IM or documentTo embed this page, paste this HTML in website

Scriabin in Russian musicology and its background in Russian intellectual history

ALEXANDER SCRIABIN IN RUSSIAN MUSICOLOGY
AND ITS BACKGROUND IN RUSSIAN INTELLECTUAL HISTORY
by
Don Louis Wetzel
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
University of Southern California
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(HISTORICAL MUSICOLOGY)
May 2009
Copyright 2009 Don Louis Wetzel

The specialized writings by Russians of the early twentieth century on the composer Alexander Scriabin reveal an astonishing diversity of critical, political, and artistic viewpoints. The reasons for this variance can be found in the very personality of the composer. The elusive qualities of Scriabin's music and the ambiguous nature of his ideas lent themselves well to this multivalence of interpretational standpoints. It was exactly these traits that insured the durability of his music in the tumultuous first decades of the twentieth century. The following dissertation discusses the social and philosophical influences on Scriabin and contextualizes the reception and various attitudes in Russia towards the composer.; In an era when ideology and polemics played an important role, a perpetual conflict developed between the preservation of old values and the dissemination of new ideas. The controversy raged between the conservative and the progressive elements, realism and modernism, emotionalism and rationalism. Many of the creative minds in Russia were caught in the crossfire and fell victim to it. However, the disarming beauty of Scriabin's music and his utopian ideals, although not entirely impervious to criticism, provided the composer and his legacy with a certain inviolability which would guarantee his survival within a highly unstable, metamorphic environment.; The period covered in the dissertation extends from the end of the nineteenth century through the first three decades of the twentieth century, overlapping on occasion the early years of Stalinism. Here, it has been necessary to make certain comparisons with some later musicologists as well as those who were active before, during, and after the early years of the Communist Revolution.

ALEXANDER SCRIABIN IN RUSSIAN MUSICOLOGY
AND ITS BACKGROUND IN RUSSIAN INTELLECTUAL HISTORY
by
Don Louis Wetzel
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
University of Southern California
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(HISTORICAL MUSICOLOGY)
May 2009
Copyright 2009 Don Louis Wetzel